US players' association becoing a reality

An association of all US cricketers, intended to represent the 10,000-odd regular players in the USA, is on the drawing board and is expected to announce its formal existence in November.

The name of the association has not been decided. It could be called the American Cricketers Association (ACA), so as not to get its acronym confused with the USACA. Membership to ACA will be open to all cricketers who do not serve in executive or administrative positions in any US cricket league or organization, and are playing members of any registered cricket club in the USA.

The need for such an organization has been felt over the past few years in US cricket, but gathered momentum over the past few seasons. The shocking performances of the USA team at the ICC Trophy made US cricketers realize that the best talent was simply not being selected to play, because of US cricket politics. Then the tussles over sending state teams to the NLC Interstate Tournament, where many players complained they were threatened with serious consequences if they participated, seem to have galvanized the ACA into action. And the current stalemate in US cricket politics left most of them with a bad taste in their mouth. Only a properly organized ACA could stand up for cricketers' rights in such situations, it was felt, and the outlines of an ACA began to form on the drawing board.

The first aim of the ACA is to develop a national membership, based on common goals that are to be fully defined and approved. After this is accomplished, ACA could officially request that an ACA representative with non-voting privileges be included in every selection committee for US national teams, and would report to ACA and USACA on the fairness of the proceedings. If serious problems were found with the selections, the ACA report would be presented to the USACA Board for action - if the issues were not resolved, ACA could institute legal proceedings against the USACA and report its findings to ICC. Eventually, the same procedures would be applied to regions selecting teams for a national tournament.

So far, the organizers of the ACA have operated on a low-key basis. They have posted memos and invitations to US cricketers to express interest in the overall idea, and have promised that a draft outline of a proposed constitution will be ready in November. This will be finalized by the end of that month, whereupon it is expected to be finally adopted by the cricketers.

So far, there has been no recognition, let alone comment, on the proposed American Cricket Association on the part of USACA, CLP or MLC. Unofficially, many USACA and CLP officials have been decidedly lukewarm to the idea; a CLP official has even been quoted as saying that cricket administration such as match schedules, team selection et cetera, was no business of the players, whose job was to play!

MLC has taken a more cautious approach. While considering the idea to be "somewhat premature", it has expressed full willingness to discuss player concerns openly with players themselves, and pointed out that the change in the format of the Interstate Tournament came about largely through player input.

On its part, the ACA organizers are optimistic and committed. They wish to remain anonymous for now because they do not want to add to the storms and squalls whirling around US cricket, but they have posted an e-mail address, USACricketers@aol.com, for those who may be interested, and are reporting a good response to their original announcement. In a month or two, they promise, we will know more. The wait could be a worthwhile one.